This invention relates to disposable, litter containers such as would be suitable for a cat or other small animals and includes a method for collapsing, latching and carrying the litter container without disturbing the contents.
Disposable litter containers, such as are usable for cats and other small animals popular as household pets, is a crowed field, based on Applicants search of the U.S. Patent Office files available to the public on the Internet.
Providing for and disposing of pet waste such as excrement and urine in urban settings is a necessity, albeit unpleasant and unsanitary task and one of the main reasons more people do not have cats.
Inventors of the prior art were obviously well aware of the need for a disposable litter container, however there are still limitations in their approaches. One of the major deficiencies in the prior art is that one has to be in close proximity of the animal waste when readying a container for replacement or disposing of the waste material that includes absorbent filler mixed with animal waste. A litter container without handles usually requires one to hold the container with two hands to keep the container level while transporting for disposal as seen in U.S. Pat. No. 4,792,082 to Williamson (1988), U.S. Pat. No. 5,014,649 to Taft (1988) and U.S. Pat. No. 5,337,700 to Toft (1993). This approach has one""s hands closer to the animal waste as well as one""s nose. Animal wastes smells and is unsanitary.
Several of the prior art litter containers as seen in U.S. Pat. No. 4,487,163 to Jobert (1982), U.S. Pat. No. 5,129,364 to Pirker (1992) and U.S. Pat. No. 5,144,914 to Giannakopoulos (1991) comprising of handles on an end or side of the container designed for carrying the litter container vertically on it side prior to it being used. If one was to dispose of the litter container by using these same handles the filler along with the animal waste would be disturbed as the container went from a horizontal plane to a vertical one thereby increasing the risk of spilling the contents. None of the prior art lifter containers found in my search included a latching handle such as it was usable to carry the litter container in an undisturbed horizontal plane after it has been in use.
Several of the litter containers shown in the prior art use multiple pieces of cardboard or other type panels as in U.S. Pat. No. 5,337,700 to Toft (1993) or use an oversize panel being die cut with a large percent of the panel material going to waste as in U.S. Pat. No. 4,784,082 to Williamson (1988) making the successful commercialization of the product much less likely.
The present invention is a collapsible disposable lifter container with an improved method of carrying and latching said litter container and contents which include latching handles that permits said litter container to be carried in an undisturbed horizontal plane minimizing shifting of the filler materials and animal waste while in the open and usable condition and additionally after folding down to a compact size to save space for disposal.
A one piece disposable litter container comprising of a bottom member and 2 end panels with folding flaps along with 2 side panels forming a rectangular container along with left and right folding side panels with cutouts and a top member with latching handles and locking tab and support privacy panel forming the collapsible cover.
The litter container is die cut from 1 piece of integral cardboard sheet which when folded in an appropriate fashion results in a compact litter storage container for shipping, storage and disposal.
The litter container may be folded open and held there by the support privacy panel to provide a covered litter container with an end open and suitable for cats and other small animals. By reversing this folding procedure the litter container may be returned to its prior dimensional height.
The handles are latched into the folded side panels at the perimeter of the cutouts and the locking tab inserted into the corresponding orifice to provide a compact, spill resistant container. The above procedure takes approximately 15 seconds per cycle all the while maintaining the litter container in an undisturbed horizontal plane.